Since before she could walk, Hannah has had an exceptional interest and particular way with animals. Hannah’s enthusiasm for understanding life from the animal’s perspective and her seemingly innate ability to communicate with them has driven the path forming a career where she enjoys working closely with animals.
Hannah has worked in small animal practices in Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire, she has also travelled and volunteered around the world in clinics and shelters, and spent some time working in a large RSPCA hospital and shelter in Sydney, Australia. Hannah has worked as a veterinary surgeon since 2011 and has been seeing behaviour referrals simultaneously since 2013.
Veterinary referral is essential to ensure we work as a team (behaviourist, vet and owner) to provide practical solutions for the behavioural issues. Moreover, it allows us to consider the medical history of the animal, where pain or other disease processes may influence behaviour. Follow-up support is vital for a successful treatment outcome, remaining in contact and changing techniques where necessary is crucial.
Whether you’re a vet wanting to fill the gap in your knowledge of animal behaviour or if you’re a behaviourist wanting to develop your knowledge of veterinary information and medication, we are able to bridge the gap between vets and behaviourists.
We offer behaviour consultations for animal professionals which are flexible depending on your needs, whether it be a one-off discussion on a particular behaviour case or a monthly catch-up to talk over specific cases.
Types of behaviour consultations:
Due to the traditional methods of equitation, there is a lot of conflicting advice in the horse world. Over the years, there have been multiple ways to do things, some of these are aversive, some are positive, and many methods are still used today. The large number of ways that are still used and the lack of science-based methods can be extremely confusing for vets, owners, trainers, grooms and handlers.
Our aim is to improve the quality of life for both horse and owner, this may include working on improving a particular relationship between owner and horse, or working with a youngster and introducing new things in a positive way, or working closely with the referring vet to diagnose and manage unwanted behaviours.
How can we be sure our dogs are enjoying the interaction? Look out for signs that they are nice and relaxed and that they want you to continue, as we can see from Doofer in this video. Also, watch out for things such as lip licks, yawns, ears back, tail lowering, a full body shake, and so on, which can sometimes be signs that our dogs aren’t fully comfortable with an interaction.
This video from PDSA shows how to safely remove a tick:
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